


After The End

by elbowsinsidethedoor



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Fix-It, John did not die, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 08:18:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10783029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elbowsinsidethedoor/pseuds/elbowsinsidethedoor
Summary: Tipsylex did it to me again with her story, "The End," reawakening the pain of season five. Here is another attempt to reunite Harold and John beyond the dire events of the series' finale.





	After The End

John tried to open his eyes, tried to move his body and there was nothing, like trying to inhabit wet clay. He retreated into darkness.

He was climbing a mountain, underwater; a creature of the sea, breathing water as his hands and feet dug into the flesh of the mountain, propelling him upward. Light shimmered above. In the next moment he was drowning, clawing his way on a crumbling rocky slope, desperate to breathe.

“John.” It was Harold’s voice, shaky, excited. “Ms Shaw, he’s awake!”

Light bled in through his lashes as he gasped for air. Alive. I’m alive. He calmed his body with the force of his will. The mountain, the water, the climb, fading.

Harold. Harold. Here with him. Shaw.

John hung on, resisting the slide into darkness, focusing on Harold’s face. He looked thinned, ruffled, anxious … real.

“John.” His voice had calmed. It was tender. His gaze was steady and though John was half-numbed, still clay-like, he felt a pressure and managed to move his fingers … to better feel that Harold was holding his hand. He was slipping.

No! He wanted to protest and struggled but … he was in the sea.

Harold was with him in the water. They were naked, floating in a gentle wave. It buoyed them upward and the sun shone warm on their heads. The water sluicing around his naked limbs was blissful, caressing his torso, between his legs, and every sensation was sweeter knowing Harold was sharing it, smiling at him.

Harold took his hand in the water.

 

***

That any of them had survived was a miracle, but especially John. The missile defense site situated off the coast of New York was a secret installation, overseen by the US Navy and not officially in operation yet. It’s untested automated systems were brought on line (causing a shit-storm of panic aboard the USS Alexandria) by Samaritan’s missile launch.

The activation was the site’s first live test and first deployment, all in one. Officials, in shock at being operational and public, tried to paper over and cover up the action but this wasn’t a loud bang over the desert. The truth had come out and in an awkward shift, the public was celebrating the action as an unqualified success.

Thousands of lives had been saved, including the one Harold treasured above all. The controversy over who had attacked New York City with a missile, remained. Those who knew the truth would never reveal it.

Harold’s own gunshot wound, miraculously missing major organs, had threatened his life with blood loss. Once stitched up and transfused, he’d healed quickly. At least in physical terms. Unaware of John’s survival, Harold had traveled to Italy, persuaded by Shaw and Fusco to reveal himself to Grace. He’d gotten within a hundred feet of her. Seen her painting in a sunny piazza. The sight, though beautiful, was so remote, so unconnected to what his reality had become that he could not approach her.

He watched her for a while. She was a lovely sight. A beloved sight, but not one that drew him. He did not have the will or desire to recapture the past, to bring her into his present. His life had moved on, his heart had moved on. To explain himself to her, to reveal secrets untold in the four years they’d been together, he could think of no reason for it beyond an offering to the past.

The partner who truly knew him, who had shared his life, was gone. Someone he’d loved fiercely without ever acknowledging the depths of his feelings … to himself, or to the one he loved.

Loss felt like the one true thing. The fresh wound of losing John, losing Root. The scars of losing Nathan, losing Grace. Harold turned around … and went home. Home to a safe house in New York City. Painful, but real to him.

He contacted Shaw the night of his return, to report his failure, his presence. She and Fusco were the family that remained to him. And Bear. He wanted the comfort of his dog, a connection to John.

“You’re back?” she’d said. He never expected much from her, emotionally, but there was an oddness in her voice.

“Yes. Italy … wasn’t possible. I’m grateful to you for looking after Bear, but I’d like to have him back, if it’s not a problem.”

“Fusco has him. But, Harold. There’s something you need to know.”

He waited. When it came, the news that John was alive made him doubt his sanity. He thought he misheard her. The words made no sense. He felt himself reeling though he was seated at the table.

“Alive?” he could scarcely articulate the word.

“He’s in a coma, Harold. He’s been hospitalized since it happened. A John Doe. No ID. Fusco identified him a couple days ago.” They’d kept it from him.

“And you were going to call me … when?” he demanded softly, his voice choked.

“Take it easy. I thought you were in Italy, with Grace.” The thought that they had kept this from him, even for a second …

“Where are you? What hospital?”

She answered with a sigh of resignation.

He was there as fast as a taxi could take him and by the time he got there he’d had John moved to a private suite. Money had its uses. An extra bed. This would be his home. This was where he belonged.

Seeing her, a small dark figure, dwarfed beside the massive hospital bed and the long, supine figure of his beloved friend, some of his anger gave way. She didn’t know. Was ill-equipped, even if she had known, to understand how desperately he loved this man, how badly he needed to be with him, in whatever state he existed. There were tears running down his cheeks as he neared the bed.

John’s injuries were extensive, the headshot being the worst, the reason for the medically induced coma. His head was partially shaved, his chest rising and falling with the rhythm of assisted breathing. IVs, feeding tube, a score of bandages … but alive. Skin warm under Harold’s fingertips as he stroked his arm, a touch more intimate, more affectionate than he’d ever shared with him before.

“We were going to tell you, if … when he recovered. Fusco convinced me that someone should get some happiness out of this mess. You had a chance to put it all behind you, Finch.”

Harold couldn’t forgive yet but did not speak of it. Instead, he demanded what she knew of the status of John’s injuries.

 

***

Harold involved himself as much as he could in John’s care. The nursing staff encouraged him to assist with the tasks he could perform. At least twice a day, Harold moisturized his friend’s elegant hands and feet. Touching him with unabashed affection in ways he’d never dared to before.

“Talk to him,” the nurses encouraged. And Harold did. Especially in the night, if he was alone with him.

“I know this is a difficult world to return to, John. You’ve given so much and here I am, asking for more. I love you. I know I never said such a thing to you, I can only hope you felt it.”

Many were the nights that Shaw came. If Harold was awake, she’d take his bed. If he was in it, she’d take the chair. She was there round the clock when the doctors made the decision to take him off the drugs that were keeping him sedated. Encouraging his return to consciousness.

She was there when he opened his eyes the first time and brought the doctors. Fleeting but precious moments.

Afterwards, Harold was unwilling to let go. He’d felt John squeeze his hand and he could not make himself let go. Eventually, he’d rested his head on his arm on the hospital bed, much as he used to fall asleep at his desk. Despite multiple cups of tea he nodded off. 

When he woke he lifted his head, blinking groggily. His body’s protest of the cramped posture was probably what had awakened him, he thought, until he found a pair of azure eyes gazing steadily at him as if he were the most fascinating sight in the world. Harold’s heart warmed in his chest and he felt tears start in his eyes. He lifted John’s hand, still clutched in his and pressed his lips against it before settling it back on the bed to release it.

“Are you in pain, John?” he asked, voice barely above a whisper to hold back weeping though the tears were falling.

John cleared his throat.

“Harold.” So soft, Harold only heard it because he was straining to hear. He levered himself out of the chair, braced his hands on the bed and leaned forward.

“Don’t strain, John. I’ll go get the doctor.”

“You kissed me.”

The words were faint, but the beginnings of the half smile spoke volumes. With so little, John said so much.

**Author's Note:**

> My medical knowledge is non-existent so please forgive inaccuracies. It's a fantasy about fictitious characters and situations!


End file.
